The page is brown. It’s fifty years old, of course, half a century since I slid a buck and a quarter of lawn mowing money across the counter in Jess Ruttles’ Port Gamble General Store, when Mom turned her back to grab a couple cans of chili. Half a century since a book changed me forever.
It’s brown with age, and it’s brown from flipping to the end countless times in those fifty years.
“…would I do that? When it’s over for me, would I be hanging on with the Ross Eversoles?”
Do you think, when Jim Bouton wrote those words, paused, held his pen over the paper, deciding what to write next… Do you think he knew they’d lead into the greatest closing line of any book ever?
Speaking of Bouton… we’ll digress for a minute. You seriously have to see this movie. The Portland Mavericks were Jim Bouton’s personal Ross Eversoles in the 1970s, when he knew the end was close.
“Battered Bastards” takes you back. Back to
hope and hilarity on a ratty diamond for a few seasons in Portland.
In Bouton’s honor, and we honor him regularly here, we present the Ross Eversoles bracket in our search for the 2020 Ex-Mariner of the Year.
And, boy, was it a search. Places where guys are hanging on because the game won’t let go. Australia. Korea. Germany, for god’s sake. Really. Baseball in Europe. We slogged the rosters of every team we could find. No luck. No ex-Mariners.
Until we struck gold. We found a league, a winter league, from which Major League Baseball has actually banished its own players. Can you get more Ross Eversoles than a league targeted by MLB that way? Would you head south knowing you can kiss your pro career goodbye if you set foot on a Venezuelan diamond? Our two ex-Mariners are exceptions to that rule as they are native Venezuelans. But still. It must seem a lot like, well… the Kentucky Industrial League.
These ex-Mariners are also both named Jesus. So there’s that. A little extra faith in the mission to just… keep… playing.
We’re already suckers for tragic heroes over here. And we found one. “Ice Cream Jesus” Montero – named for a scout’s creative way of pointing out Jesus was forty pounds overweight – put up just 18 plate appearances with Las Aguilas del Zulia in 2020. He went hitless, plus a walk, for .056 OBP. Something about the story… washed up at 31, still hanging on… Bouton was 31 when he wrote those words about hanging on… is Montero injured? Did he walk away? Get cut? I mean, god, did Las Aguilas give up on Jesus?
Montero hasn’t signed with a MLB organization since the Orioles released him four years ago. You really gotta feel for the guy.
And don’t forget we sent Michael Pineda of the Diabolical Slider to the Yankees for Ice Cream Jesus:
For a happier tale, we turn to “Sugar Jesus” Sucre. Sucre, of course, is the French word for sugar. Sucre is also the name of the Venezuelan state where Jesus was born, named for the Sucre family, prominent politically in Venezuela, with origins back to the 1600s. In the midst of said prominence, our Jesus Sucre is listed as a notable member of the family on their Wikipedia page. This is a true story.
But baseball… yes, baseball. Sugar Jesus swatted a regular-season .302 for Los Caribes de Anzoategui, and .294 in the playoffs to help send his team to next week’s Venezuelan Championship series.
Funny thing about this sweet story – his V-League web site photo has him in a Mariner cap. That Wiki listing says he’s a Mariner (present tense). He’s only 32, only a year out of the majors. Whaddya say, Jerry? One more shot?
This was the last of four XMotY brackets. See what you missed —
Who’s your ex-Mariner of the Year for 2020? Please vote in the comments.
Same name, same position, same country of origin. That’s about it though.
Montero, an overweight offense-first “catcher” who wasn’t very good at it. Another overhyped Yankee prospect like so many before him. At the time it seemed like a great win-win trade as the M’s needed a catcher with pop and the evil empire needed cheap pitching. His MiLB numbers looked good but could he stick behind the plate? Would his hitting stats in the minors translate to The Show? The M’s were a little desperate after Kenji left and they cycled through the likes of Johnson, Moore, Quiroz, Bard, and Olivo. In the minors he consistently hit at a .300+ clip with some power.
Montero actually wasn’t too bad in that first year, 2012. He batted .260 with 15 ding dongs catching about a third of the games. But his bad defense behind the plate dragged his WAR down into the negatives.
Going forward he just couldn’t get his shit together. Was he lazy? Had he reached his ceiling? Was he homesick? Too much junk food?
I don’t know, I wasn’t there.
Did I mention he was the slowest person on the team? After the 2012 season the coaches even worked with him all offseason to teach him how to run. In Spring Training 2013 Montero said in an interview “I spent a lot of time running and working on my techniques about running, That’s what I did. I ran a lot and I learned how to run.” Well Sir, you may have learned how to run but not very fast.
2013 didn’t go well. Only 26 games behind the plate due to lack of progress in learning the position. Aaand that was it. Could they get him back on track as a DH? Um. No. How ’bout 1st base? Uhuh. Between 2013 and 2015 he played
in 73 total games. Then his little ice cream issue in Everett. jesus.
JESUS! I love(d) Sucre. Such a fun, baby-faced lad.
Originally signed by the Atlanta Barves (yes, Barves. ) When, in 2011, they cut him loose after six years in the org, he found himself heading to the M’s AA team in Jackson, TN. Up and down between Tacoma and The Bigs over the next five years, he never played in more than 50 games in a season but did earn .5 WAR in 2016.
He’s best known to me for a couple of shiny moments. One…he caught Kuma’s no-no in 2015 and 2…he came in to pitch two innings in the same year and only gave up three runs.
After being traded to the Rays after the 2016 season (for a bucket of used baseballs) he amassed 135 games catching over two years basically playing at replacement level. Jesus added on a last year in Baltimore before heading home into the sunset.
Sugar was a treat of a role player who was well liked in the clubhouse and by the fanbase. Hard working and true to his love for catching, he was a real antithesis to the crap we were seeing behind the plate in the 2010s.
Amen.
Hoo boy Dave! Lotta truth and a lotta pain in there. Thanks for the deeper insight. The selection committee has a tough road — might have to wait to see how that Venezuelan championship turns out.
Bygones Bill. Bygones. Let our memories live, whether their correct or not.